Posts by cbars

React team observes that running everything on the client can be costly, aims to fix it with Server Components

Yes indeed, managing documentation is a key part of it. By good docs, I dont mean documenting the names of variables, or internal data types, or view layout witeframes etc etc

I mean appropriate documentation that documents interfaces, specifies assumptions and most critically of all explains the business objectives of the software.

"What does this do?"

"Dont know but if we don't run it then X (downstream) breaks"

"Awesome"

Yes, Jesus, obviously a working system comes first, but the amount of code I see that doesn't even have a README.... how can you tell its working if you havnt got the requirements documented...?

Right. This is the 5th or 6th comment I've seen like this so apologies for picking on yours but:

I've been in this game a few years, so am by no means a young 'un, but I've heard this crap for my entire career and while I agree that this is a futile dance of circles I do not agree its youthful arrogance. Want to know why "kids these days" don't know about what went on in the 80's...?

Your documentation was shit.

Thats it. Yours was, the companies you worked for didn't bother either, and no one has preserved any of what docs there were because they are crap.

*The* biggest difference, and the best contribution a developer can make is to write solid docs.

Thats it.

When I join a project and find a good doc, it doesnt really matter how crap the code is, it will live on, because I understand the intention and can have confidence in any changes (and assure them with targeted investigations). If there are no docs, no way does anyone have any other option than to back away slowly and start building something to fit the current state of play elsewhere.

Thats because you're paid to get shit working not reverse engineer some code that the author was "so proud of" that they couldn't even be bothered to put their name on it.

*That* attitude scales, and spreads, and is the root of all evil.

So its great to hear you have so much enterprise experience and you're also fighting the good fight to ensure all your KDDs get documented, your architecture and quick fixes are in a centralised and indexed change log etc; just don't blame the "kids" for not being able to follow the spaghetti dungeons that idiots built.

Honestly, I once heard some old boy brag that he built and deployed a business critical application within 3 days, and if that doesn't shock you then there is no hope.

You know what "real" engineers and architects do for the majority of the time? Yeah, its documentation. If you're not doing that, you're a brick layer, and I hope you're following someone else's instructions.

(Once again, not personal! "You" is generic and at the other comments too :))

Edit: also, no disrespect to brick layers, but you won't find a bricky saying he's an architect

Amazon Web Services launches appeal after losing $12m AWS trademark war in China to local biz Actionsoft

Boo hoo

They were already a massive company in 2002, OK not anywhere near where they are now but still a household name. They focused on the US as usual and forgot to focus on foreign markets. Actionsoft beat them to it in this and they're now getting annoyed.

I get it, why spend money defending your businesss before you know if you can succeed in a market... well, this is why. This is the flipsode of "growth", you've got to manage your growth, or you'll get out maneuvered

Scotland waves £15m around to tempt low-code partner to help with social security overhaul as technical debt mounts

Re: Low code needs to start at the policy end

G's us

No wonder you think low-code is good.

if cant_be_bothered_to_sanity_check is True:

take_shortcut_without_thinking()

.move_fast()

.break_things()

If you can't solve a problem by thinking logically and organising people, information and processes, it doesn't matter how you implement your shit, broken solution - you've not solved the problem.

If it's solved, then I'd go for a solution with longevity like an open source programming language, over a proprietary UI on top of the same open source language.... but sure... call me back in 5 years when you want to reimplement the same solution through a different abstraction layer, I'll take your money again :)

Hong Kong's Hutchison Group, which runs mobile carrier ‘3’, protests as USA puts it on new China ban list

Re: Dear World. I'm sorry...speak for youself.. well thats interesting

El Reg commentards are usually smart enough not to use a political narrative, as each article provides the specific issues for discussion. Try thinking about specific issues, discussing them, and you'll get on better, keeping them relevant to the article is even better.

This is not somewhere I come to read and "be informed" about other peoples broad beliefs, that is too much to ask. Pick a single topic and I *might* be bothered to think about it, but only if you do the work and provide relevant information which I apparently don't have already.

If you're not trying to be helpful to that end, keep your noise to yourself as I bet there is a joke here I would rather read.

'Following the science' rhetoric led to delay to UK COVID-19 lockdown, face mask rules

Re: Trickledown economics

"By that definition it would have to be reduced"

No. The word maintained was there to account an increase in quality of life without a change in income differential.

The "developed" world didnt get this way by making cool stuff. We nicked a shitload and enslaved a lot of people, as has happened all over history and I'm not making any claim as to whether that's relevant anymore, but its relevant if you think we just invented our way to wealth....

Yes. Thats what I'm saying. You only deserve a tax break if you're proportionally benefitting society over and above what the government could do with the money- if you cant, then give the money to government and let them spend it. If you lose, yes, you get taxed, but you're "rich", and that is the deal (in my fantasy argument).

Yes, well, clearly I don't know anything about you and I'm sure you're not an imbecile, I'm just calling it based on your ludicrous arguments, don't take it to heart

Re: Trickledown economics

"In fact if the rich didnt increase wealth then trickle down surely couldnt work to improve everyones lives"

By "work", you mean fiscal and quality of life improvements for the non-rich (however that's defined)?

If the rich maintained their level of wealth, and the non-rich increased theirs, or their quality of life, the income inequality would be either maintained or reduced. Despite the fact its clearly bollocks, actually it could very well work without increasing inequality, and indeed it doesnt make sense to me how it could work while increasing inequality... so, the rich dont need more money, this is just a lie told to give non-rich people hope, because religion isn't working very well anymore and people are starting to get upset.

You are either a troll, or a child-minded imbecile, to believe that making the wealthy wealthier is in anyones interest but their own.

The only way it could possibly, ever work, would be to require the tax break be applied to investments which are later found to be successful - that is, not buying a house for your children which is not sold, actually creating a business that generates jobs and profit

The nightmare is real: 'Excel formulas are the world's most widely used programming language,' says Microsoft

Re: Inappropriate

You can judge something as inappropriate if you have sufficient knowledge of the tool in question. For example, using a combine harvester to pop to the shop to get some milk. Nothing functionally wrong here, it works, but its inappropriate in the general case.

(Here is where jake pops up and says he does this all the time ;))

Your example does not prove that Excel is appropriate for building neural nets, its an example that its a flexible, powerful tool - which is indeed why it can be used so widely, in my opinion, inappropriately.

Makes sense

Excel becomes the inappropriate tool for yet another class of problems

China bans encryption exports – including quantum and key management tech

Re: Omnisec

If you're going to use "google" as an adjective, please don't capitalise the first letter like a Noun. It took me 5 attempts to understand the third sentence, and having spent all the effort there, I didn't bother trying to understand the rest of your post. I'm still not sure I understand the third sentence, actually.

Considering the colonisation of Mars? Werner Herzog would like a word

Re: Humans like locusts

I dont know about Neil, but for me: morals cannot occur without life. Life is by definition continued, so the only imperative that makes sense is to continue. Living on two planets improves the odds of success in meeting that imperative, so any moral definition would prefer it. The alternative is to not continue, which violates the process of life and is therefore either a contradiction or meaningless.

Everything is natural, including humans, no need to get all high and mighty. Does it really matter that humans have caused extinctions....? Emotionally yes, literally no. Once you understand that it's smooth sailing, all the way to Mars and beyond baby.

Though it would of course be nice if people would all stop at 2 kids, eh? (I say that as child 3 of more!) Maybe buy the veg thats not wrapped in plastic and just wash it...? We can dare to dream

China offers world its COVID QR Code movement passport at G20 Leaders' Meeting

nucleic acid test

So... everyone has a DNA test and your government shares it with others in a QR code? Err... not my favourite idea actually.

Linux Foundation, IBM, Cisco and others back ‘Inclusive Naming Initiative’ to change nasty tech terms

Re: Sigh...

Ah, yes, thats an interesting comparison, but I'm not convinced it can be the same without without the religious angle giving you the "right" to "save" other people from their beliefs.

When the suggestions become mandatory, thats when I'll worry - until then, if you want to dig through yotabytes of machine instructions looking for objectionable material... go nuts

Re: Sigh...

400 years? English was around well before, and slavery too.

The use of the term slave to refer to a logical process.... a lot less time, maybe 80 years, 100?

I dont agree that changing the term is useful, but I don't like arguments that try to fight this on a linguistic level. Language changes, and frankly its unusual that we have data from even 50 years ago at such volume. We've never had this problem before, signs rotted and books either got ravaged or were archived away from the populace.

I think its a new problem, and its interesting what we'll do about it. How to resolve data longevity and societal change?

Microsoft warns against SMS, voice calls for multi-factor authentication: Try something that can't be SIM swapped

Re: Errrr

@Dan 55

I'm talking about someone from the toaster selling company telling people not to use a toaster.

You're talking about what you think would be an appropriate design choice, and your argument is MS shouldn't offer SMS MFA, because its not the best. This would either leave a whole class of people who don't have smart phones with just passwords or outside MS products. Both of those are worse for MS than implementing the 'good' and the 'best', and allowing people to use 'good but expensive' over nothing.

So.... I would recommend SMS MFA over nothing, and I'd recommend supporting multiple MFA implementations if you can afford it.

Dnt b mean 2 txt msgs dey r gr8 4 sum

Re: Errrr

That is *such* a weird argument. If you're going to buy something, sure there are varying degrees of quality and price point, but either you have the thing or you dont. For example, a toaster. Having toast from a 'bad' toaster is still toast, even though the toaster doesn't have the top of the range functionality. The advantage is toast, or in this case, having MFA vs no MFA.

Errrr

This is the perfect being the enemy of the good, again.

"You shouldn't use MFA because of SIM swapping"? That is stupid. Instead of being vulnerable to every single device on the Internet, you're now vulnerable to a small sub set of that, and require people to speak to people which is more risky, requires more skills and is overall, obviously, a more secure position.

"You shouldn't wear a bullet proof vest, soldier, someone can just shoot you in the head"

Fucks sake.

Now-patched Ubuntu desktop vulnerability allows privilege escalation

Re: Ubunt-who?

For example? Ubuntu is a big deal as far as Linux distros go

Also, secondary follow up: what is the metric we should use to gauge "industrial strength"?

Finally: what level of market share is required before we need to invest time finding bugs? If we only need to worry about the big boys, you mean that anything goes until you're, say, 20% of the market?

We did NAT see that coming: How malicious JavaScript can open holes in your firewall for miscreants to slip through

Stars and bucks

To this researcher, well done!

The device level firewall would work to block this too though, right? If one was in a coffee shop and couldn't control the router.

Or a global pandemic closing all coffee shops... there's usually more than one solution!

Windows kernel vulnerability disclosed by Google's Project Zero after bug exploited in the wild by hackers

Re: Snappy comeback from Microsoft

and what does edge now use?

Its turtles all the way down man

Just cough into your phone, please... MIT lab thinks it can diagnose COVID-19 from the way you expectorate

Useless

Discerning a forced cough and COVID is as useful as asking, have you got a cough? But really, have you?

Anyone with a cold/other cough in the sample...?

Update to NHS COVID-19 app brings improved warnings, end to 'ghost' notifications

Re: Good

One thing that drives me nuts is people posting "me too", "I have the same issue" on an issue (e.g. GitHub) without adding any additional information like a different version number tested or a test case not in the original report.

Not saying that's a reason to down vote someone's El Reg comment but I checked your comment history and your "discovery" of this issue was not downvoted, it was your accusation of another commentard as a racist.

Brit accused of spying on 772 people via webcam CCTV software tells court he'd end his life if extradited to US

Re: Team America: World Police

The point is the UK should care what foreign laws are broken an not allow such loose treaties, otherwise a lot of people are going to have to get extradited to China for going on Facebook, to SA for drinking alcohol....

I would argue if he's jailed in the UK, job done. If the US want to stop "wire fraud" from other countries (which other countries don't agree is fraud at all), they are free to protect their citizens and cut the wires.

Pakistan calls on Facebook to extend holocaust denial ban into Islamophobia crackdown

I dont understand how you can say Charlie Hebdo was an inevitable result of marginalisation, free practicing of Islam is permitted and common in France, along with the rest of Europe. Making a fucking joke is not marginalisation, the ability and freedom to do so is the core of European identity and *is the reason* Europe allows Islam, Christianity, Scientology, Homeopathy, and everything else.

Extremism is a consequence of many things, poor education, existing mental health issues, indoctrination etc etc.

I'm not an expert, but I know for a fact its not caused by cartoons. This guy, can fuck right off. What a sour start to a Monday.

Crown Prosecution Service solicitor accused of targeting judge ex-wife's lover through work computer systems

Re: ?

OK, so now we're arguing about whether the OPs interpretation was correct or not, and not the definition of a word. Great. I don't know about you but I enjoyed that!

Also, in the theme of the thread, you would have been safe to use "their" rather than "his" :)

Re: ?

The OP specifically quoted the full phrase used, and was complaining about the inappropriate use of the word, that is: the context.

My example was to illustrate that interpretation is required when reading, my whole point was that to turn to a dictionary was a mistake. You have literally missed the point (or have you? That's a tricky one)

Though I am pleased you know about metaphors, tomorrow's lesson is on Polysemy.

Re: ?

~~~ Words have only one interpretation in all contexts. The dictionary is the rule book. Any other statement made by a human would be incorrect, meep morp. ~~~

It has negative connotations. If you interact with other humans you pick up on these things.

I'm also of the opinion that this was a poor effort and the writer should have a look in the mirror.

(Having a look in the mirror, does not literally mean examining their own reflection, it carries the connotation of shame or remorse for one's actions)

Five Eyes nations plus Japan, India call for Big Tech to bake backdoors into everything

Re: DB7E1DD27CE1AD9B90C2F568B8F92C597A72080B

How much of it is javascript?

Here's US Homeland Security collaring a suspected arsonist after asking Google for the IP addresses of folks who made a specific search

Re: Not happening all that often?

I doubt that

Disgraced cop, 55, spared prison term after admitting he abused police systems to snoop on his girlfriend's ex

You think it would be proportional, after 24 years on the force.... 24 years, to completely remove his financial security because he committed a non violent crime and admitted to all charges?

If that is what you were implying, I hope you're not in a position of authority.

Now, if he was using his access to arrange burglaries of high value victims, or otherwise seeking to profit financially from his privilege then I might be more inclined to agree that a financial penalty was appropriate

Looking for a new hobby to kill the COVID-19 blues? Join NASA's Planet Patrol to hunt for alien worlds

I'll wait

One day, in the far future, when we seek out new worlds and new civilisations, this will be a real job and you'll be paid for doing it.

(Our ever expanding population will necessitate the discovery of worlds and peoples for us to exploit and consume, here's hoping)

Oracle gears up to fend off RPA and workflow upstarts by pouring more automation into core enterprise apps

Re: RPA?

You're expected to be deliberatly reading an IT focused news website and be familiar with common abbreviations and acronyms

(IT here stands for a new industry known to some as Information Technology)

Give the journo a break, are you telling me you've never missed an entry out of your "abbreviations", or "acronyms" table, which you have in all your documentation?

If you like, you could use some Robotic Process Automation to look up abbreviations in websites which don't list them, or post a comment signalling your displeasure on related comments sections..... wait a minute....

England's COVID-tracking app finally goes live after 6 months of work – including backpedal on how to handle data

Re: Testing?

If its taken changes to Bluetooth handshakes to get it working, they would have to coordinate or risk news reports saying "it works, but only for iPhones/Android". Thats a mutually bad situation so just do it together for the public good, ahem, good publicity

GNOME alone: FOSS desktop folk to start counting in whole numbers again

Re: "especially from an engagement and marketing perspective"

It is a bit weird that 1.10 is smaller than 1.8, and if this really were a number should mean 1.10 is the earlier release.

Ambiguity: Famously an excellent approach to engineering...

Re: "especially from an engagement and marketing perspective"

Its in the article, GTK 4.0 is about to be released, they both have Gnome in the name so distgiushing the two in a search engine (never mind stack overflow) will be tricky. "There's a bug in Gnome blah blah 4.0" will cause confusion.

It makes sense to me, also the entire premise of the article is that sub numbers get confusing, so they don't want a 4.1, or to confuse that Gnome 2, Gnome 3 are *really* different, but the difference between 4 and 5 is trivial.

Woman dies after hospital is unable to treat her during crippling ransomware infection, cops launch probe

Re: Why?

It would go away if paying the ransom was outlawed or crypto currency?

Are you suggesting that this would go away without Bitcoin etc al... are you sure...?

Amazon gets its tax excuses in early amid rising UK profits – but leaves El Reg off the press list. Can't think why

Re: Not the fault of Amazon

Yea but come on, its really hard to work out how to publicly prevent these shinnanigans while still keeping it legal to pay your mates and profit on the sly - give the MPs a break! If they make it too hard, there will be no cushy job waiting for them when they get voted out, and the opposition will just open a loophole once they're in anyway, so really there is nothing to be done and we should all be grateful that the Americans let us keep any of our money at all

AWS Aurora PostgreSQL versions vanish from the mega-cloud for days, leaving customers in the dark

Re: Aurora

Comment was a bit tongue in cheek, a bug in Amazon's code meaning it doesn't work with it, and is therefore a trademark infringement...

So how come they can call it PostgreSQL if the code has been forked to do Amazon stuff.... that's a trademark infringement, surely

From postgres trademark policy, unacceptable use:

"Use of the name(s) or logo in a software product that is unrelated to PostgreSQL and does not run on it, or work with it."

0ops. 1,OOO-plus parking fine refunds ordered after drivers typed 'O' instead of '0'

Re: And this ladies and gentlemen...

Yes we do

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/vehicle-registration-numbers-and-number-plates

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/vehicle-registration-numbers-and-number-plates

i ("eye") is not used.

I suppose you could sort that with a QR code in addition to human readable, so copper's ANPR doesn't get confused either, no matter how creative the screw placement

Infosec big names rally against US voting app maker's bid to outlaw unsanctioned bug hunting via T&Cs

Re: Free your mind...

What? Oh, you mean the second North American Civil War... Yes, let's go from IT security disclosure straight to nuclear factions.

US military takes aim at 2024 for human-versus-AI aircraft dogfights. Have we lost that loving feeling for Top Gun?

Re: A new missile race?

Bullets are cheaper than drones, we would just need a way to kill swarms of drones and the missiles can be kept for bigger fish.

For example, really good/AI aiming systems for turrets mounted rifles, shrapnel 'grenades', a big net, diversionary utilities c.f. chaff to shake drones off, outmaneouvering e.g. altitude etc etc

You won't eliminate dog fights, you'll just find other ways to fight before you get to that point, thats why soldiers still need hand to hand combat training.

Whether this will actually be possible in 3 years is another question

VMware staff in Silicon Valley can leave a pandemic, wildfire-ridden zone – if they're willing to accept less pay

Re: Simples

Cheap you say? I'll stop you there, I've heard enough!

Cops called to Singapore golf club after 'wrongdoers' use scripts to book popular timeslots

I cite discrimination based on reflexes and availability.

Fairest solution is the bookings are open for 24 hours (plus a week or whatever), and after that the slots are assigned randomly. Youre notified if you've got one, so easier to get another slot if your available.

If you win a slot, you're excluded from other contended slots.

Doesnt matter if you're fast, and distributes slots about even, based on availability

Tough luck if you can only make the fancy slots

Apple to Epic: Sue me? No, sue you, pal!

Re: Monopolistic behaviour

From UK Warranty guidelines

"Neither the Manufacturer, the selling BMW Centre or any BMW Group company in the UK can be held responsible for modifications to the vehicle which lead to defects, unless those modifications have been approved by the Manufacturer, an Authorised BMW Centre or a BMW Service Authorised Workshop"

You can smash your iPhone with a hammer, sure, but Apple are not letting you...

My point is, they are not obliged to support or replace a device which is taken 'outside' its purposful scope - and that scope is entirely defined by the manufacturer, as far as I can see... I can't believe I'm arguing it either, I have a problem!

Re: Monopolistic behaviour

Its not easy. I started out thinking its cut and dry, but now I think I've changed my mind... Why should apple be obliged to allow consumers to load code anyway? I cant do that with my washing machine (yet)...

Its clear they actively prevent developers selling stuff without gouging them... but BMW won't let you attach any old shit to their cars either.

This doesn't prevent Epic from releasing their own 'games' smartphone.

I can see app makers like SMS providers, email clients having a claim (as apple doesn't pay the 30% itself), but if Apple aren't offering an app that competes with this app, its just the cost of business - so by rights the game should cost 30% more on that hardware, and less on phones that don't take that cut. The only argument I can see is cartel behaviour with Google in collusion to prevent alternative platforms competing based on app offerings (as Apple would win that war due to fewer form factors etc)

I'm glad I'm not a lawyer, actually

Accenture dares to enter site of US Air Force mega ERP-project disaster

Me

Old and busted: Targeting servers and web bugs. New hotness: Pwning devs with targeted poisoned stacks

time, convenience and performance

So, time